


A Day Away

by tollofthebells



Series: Art Trade and Gift Fics [4]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Disguise, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Humor, Mabari Puppies, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2018-12-15
Packaged: 2019-09-18 11:48:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16994442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tollofthebells/pseuds/tollofthebells
Summary: In need of an escape from their day-to-day royal duties, Alistair and Ysabelle decide to take an undercover excursion into town.





	A Day Away

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GingerBreton](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GingerBreton/gifts).



“Noon,” Ysabelle says firmly, pressing a stack of neatly folded clothes into Alistair’s arms.

They’d only just gotten dressed for the day—Alistair in his day-to-day regalia, Ysabelle in a fine gown to match—and he’s just nearly ready to leave and hold court when she’s caught him.

“Noon what?” he asks, fumbling with the pile of clothing. “What are these?”

She smiles. “Noon,” she repeats herself, shrugging in spite of the growing grin on her face. “I’ve made up my mind. Today is the day we’re taking a vacation.”

It had started as a passing comment, a simple remark over breakfast several weeks earlier— _I wish we could just get away,_ Alistair had whined, and she sympathized. How couldn’t she? He’d proven an excellent monarch, they both had, and yet it wasn’t the life either had ever expected to lead. It wasn’t their _old_ life, it wasn’t running about chasing darkspawn and spending late nights chatting over campfires and living each day on a rush, a high, the brink of death.

It _was_ a good life, though, and what mattered was that they were together, that they were alive.

But still. It was stiff. It was monotonous, it was _routine_. And they needed a break, from court and from visiting nobles and from Eamon— _most of all_ _Eamon_ , if she was being honest—and from anyone else who pestered and nagged and bothered the two of them with matters far outside their realm of expertise or caring. And after some long thought and a small favor from one of her handmaids for the borrowed clothes, Ysabelle saw her chance. And she planned on taking it.

“A vaca— _oh_!” he says, realization dawning on him, and she nods excitedly.

“Those,” she says, indicating the clothes in his arms. “Are for you. No one will recognize you without the cape and the fur and the crown and everything. And I have some to match. They’ll be perfect disguises—no one will know it’s us.” _And we’ll be able to_ live _for once_ , she thinks to herself, _if only for an afternoon._ “The east gate, all right?” she prompts. “At noon.”

“But—in this—and—?” He stares back at her, exasperated, she _knows_ their excursion is last minute but if they’d planned it in advance they’d never have been able to pull it off. Today was the day.

She puts her hands on her hips, tulle skirts rough on her fingertips as she gives him a warning look. “Just meet me there. By the _noon_ bell strike, no later.”

“But how will I know what to look for?” he whines. His crown is a bit lopsided on his head, and she takes the opportunity to straighten it for him, smooth the epaulettes on his coat, tilt his chin up to her.

She smiles, tying her red hair back into a twist. “You’ll know, Ali,” she assures him. “Now go! If you’re late to hold court, Eamon will be after me for it. Again.”

He smiles now, worries behind him—or at least temporarily forgotten. “If he does, I’ll just set the mabari on him,” he grins. “Again.”

She laughs at that, remembering the last time—the last _few_ times, truth be told, as it was hardly a one-off occurrence for them to pluck a mabari from the royal kennels and egg it on toward Eamon, whose distaste for the dogs made him a prime target and the subject of many laughs among her, Alistair, and even Teagan, once or twice. “That’s great, love,” she says, pushing him out the door in spite of her humored smile. _Great, but hopefully unnecessary._ “But you really need to—“

“I’m going, I’m going!” he replies, jumpstarting his way out of the room, setting his crown askew _again_ , tucking the clothes beneath one arm as he half-walks, half-skips down the hall.

“Noon!” she calls after him, a final reminder.

* * *

She doesn’t expect him until at least half past. Not when Eamon likely held him back at court to pander for him to make one decision or another, not when he will most certainly have stopped to pet the new spring pups at the mabari kennels—she knows he has to pass them to reach their meeting place at the east gate—and not when he would be undoubtedly led astray by the baker in the market square calling _fruit pies!_ and _hot cookies!_ and _fresh baked rolls!_ from the little cart he sets up each day. Ysabelle had almost stopped for a pastry herself but carried on, _later, we’ll have all afternoon to do whatever we’d like_.

So it’s a pleasant surprise when he shows up not thirty but only _fifteen_ minutes past, clad somewhat clumsily in the homespun cotton tunic and plain brown trousers she’d procured for him. “Excuse me, little boy,” he starts, wary and out of breath, a bit disoriented, blatantly avoiding eye contact with her, “I’m looking for my w—er, I mean, well, this is the _east_ gate, isn’t it? I don’t get out much, but—well, I mean, I don’t get out _here_ much, out further than the—”

“It’s _me_ , Alistair,” she giggles, pulling the pageboy cap from her head and letting her bright red braids unfurl to her shoulders.

“I—wh— _Izzy_!!” he exclaims, and she has to tug him down to sit next to her just so he lowers his voice. “You said I would _know_! I didn’t know at all, I nearly got lost, and I called you ‘little boy,’ and—”

“It’s all right, Alistair,” she laughs, and she cups his jaw with her hand for a quick kiss. “Maybe I should’ve said ‘I’ would know. But I found you anyway, and you’re not as late as I thought you’d be, so everything’s all right in the end, isn’t it?” She ruffles her hand through his hair, smoothing out the bits that crimped and stuck out from the previous weight of his crown. “Now. What would you like to do first? We have all afternoon.”

He opens his mouth to answer then but stops himself when her stomach rumbles.

“Well,” Ysabelle continues thoughtfully. “All right then. Maybe we can stop at the baker’s cart in the square and _then_ decide what to do.” She looks to him expectantly. For all his constant chatter, for all his usual smiles and quips and silly remarks, he says nothing to her now. “Ali?” she prods. “The baker? He’s selling little fruit pies today.”

He raises his eyebrows, sticks his lip out thoughtfully. “Fruit pies? I didn’t see a pie—I mean, I didn’t see the baker just now. On my way over here. Just recently.”

She frowns. “You already got one, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

She gives him a good punch in the shoulder, only hard enough to provoke an exaggerated _ow!_ from him. “And you didn’t think to get me one?”

“Well I _did_ , but—”

“You had _both_ of them?”

He nods sheepishly. “They smelled so _good_!” he says defensively, giving her a half-smile when he sees her fake pout. “Aw, come on, Izzy. I’ll get you one now.” He hops back to his feet with an infectious grin, offering a hand to pull her up to her up from the grass as well.

“You’d better!” she replies, laughter in her eyes, grinning. He takes her hand in his as they stroll through the market square, a gesture they so rarely offered one another these days— _it’s improper to make such public displays of affection_ , Eamon and Isolde had barked far too many times—and he hums an old tavern tune as they watch the children playing in the spring sunshine, the square merchants calling out to the crowds of people going about their business, doing their shopping. He _does_ buy her a pie—and a chocolate cookie, too, for good measure—and with her appetite sated and her husband returned to her good graces, she leads him into the shops down the side streets in search of more adventure and more fun.

They are unrecognizable in their homespun outfits—Ysabelle in a simple blouse and trousers, Alistair in the clothes she’d given him, her hair undone, his hopelessly rumpled, her face without makeup, his lacking the shadows of stress their daily life so often painted upon him. They attract little attention, if any, and for that, she feels as though she can breathe, _really breathe_ , for the first time in a very long time. It seems, as they peruse the gifts and trinkets stacked high on the shelves of a jeweler’s shop, that Alistair is thinking the same thing—he leans over her shoulder as she eyes a ring laiden with emeralds, brushes his lips over her neck, and asks her “why is this the first time we’ve ever done this?”

She beams when she turns back to look at him. “Not sure, love,” she says softly, and he grins back. “But we should do it more often.”

She turns back to the ring—“like it?” he asks, and she nods—and enough for him. In seconds, he has the shopkeeper taking it out from behind the glass as for them look over it, inspect it carefully, “anything for you, Izzy,” Alistair says, and she’s so happy she could nearly twirl around in her excitement.

Until she sees the shopkeeper squint at them carefully. _Suspiciously_. And for a moment, her heart skips a beat and she worries they’ve been found out. _He’s going to call us out on it_ , she thinks instantly. _King and Queen of Ferelden, cover blown at last._

“Where did a couple of folks like _you_...” he says slowly, jabbing his finger out at their simple outfits, their unkempt hair. He dangles the ring out before them. “...get enough money for _this_?”

 _Shit_.

“Ahh,” Alistair starts, scuffing his shoe back and forth over the flooring. “We got...we’re just lucky?”

 _Double shit_.

“You two…” the shopkeeper begins, and Ysabelle starts to back up toward the door behind them.

“It’s time to go, Alistair,” she says through clenched teeth, a forced smile.

“But what about the—”

“We don’t want it anymore.”

“But you _liked_ —”

“It’s _fine—_ ”

“You’re a couple of _thieves_ , aren’t ya?” the shopkeeper demands.

“What?” exclaims Alistair. “I’ll have you know, you’re speaking to the _qu—_ ”

“We’re leaving!” she interrupts him, grabbing his hand and turning them around and pulling him out the door and breaking into a run.

She nearly yanks his arm out of its socket behind her; she’s always been just a _bit_ quicker to react and she shouldn’t have pulled so hard but _oh, it better save our asses this time_. She can map Denerim better than he can—she knows that for a fact—and she leads him, running, in and out of each alley, the quiet ones, the _safe_ ones (Void take her if she’s somehow responsible for Ferelden’s king being assassinated in his own city), weaving in and out and around and past people until they’re somehow back at the palace, or at least behind it, back running alongside the kennels and _we can stop now_ , she thinks, just a little too late, before one or the other of them trip—she can’t quite tell who—and they tumble together headfirst into the pen.

“ _Ow!_ ” she yelps, landing flat on her back, but she hardly has the time to decide whose fault this is. Neither of them do. In seconds, they’re swarmed with puppies—an entire litter born just a few weeks ago, if she remembers correctly, and before she knows it, Alistair has dissolved into giggles next to her, and she can’t help it, she’s grinning too, laughing and smiling back at him until her stomach hurts and she can hardly breathe and the corners of her eyes are wet with tears the pups try eagerly to lick away.

“Thieves,” he mutters when he finally catches his breath, absentmindedly petting the single puppy that actually succeeded in climbing atop him.

“Well…” she muses. “You know my past as well as I do.”

“Psh,” he says, but he can’t help but laugh anyway. “Izzy, the only worthwhile thing you’ve ever stolen was—”

“Oh, _don’t_ ” she warns, although her smile betrays her, “you’re too cheesy!”

“It was—”

“ _Alistair!_ ”

“—my heart,” he giggles, and she groans, she _knew_ it was coming, she knows him too well and _still_ her traitorous grin reveals the truth.

Because she also knows he’s right.

“Hey, Izzy,” he says softly when his laughter’s finally died down. He lets the pup climb down from his shoulder and run along with its brothers and sisters before rolling over in the straw to face her.

“Mm?”

“Can we do this again sometime?”

She grins.

“Anytime you want.”

**Author's Note:**

> What a pleasure to write something for the lovely Ysabelle Dryden and her creator, GingerBreton!


End file.
